Advances in technology allow modern display designs to render image and video content with significant improvements in various quality characteristics over the same content, as rendered on less modern displays. For example, some more modern displays are capable of rendering content with a dynamic range (DR) that is higher than the standard dynamic range (SDR) of conventional or standard displays.
For example, some modern liquid crystal displays (LCDs) have a light unit (a backlight unit, a side light unit, etc.) that provides a light field in which individual portions may be modulated separately from modulation of the liquid crystal alignment states of the active LCD elements. This dual modulation approach is extensible (e.g., to N-modulation layers wherein N comprises an integer greater than two), such as with controllable intervening layers (e.g., multiple layers of individually controllable LCD layers) in an electro-optical configuration of a display.
In contrast, some existing displays have a significantly narrower dynamic range (DR) than high dynamic range (HDR). Mobile devices, computer pads, game devices, television (TV) and computer monitor apparatus that use typical cathode ray tube (CRT), liquid crystal display (LCD) with constant fluorescent white back lighting or plasma screen technology may be constrained in their DR rendering capability to approximately three orders of magnitude. Such existing displays thus typify a standard dynamic range (SDR), sometimes also referred to as “‘low’ dynamic range” or “LDR,” in relation to HDR.
Images captured by HDR cameras may have a scene-referred HDR that is significantly greater than dynamic ranges of most if not all display devices. Scene-referred HDR images may comprise large amounts of data, and may be converted into post-production formats (e.g., HDMI video signals with 8 bit RGB, YCbCr, or deep color options; 1.5 Gbps SDI video signals with a 10 bit 4:2:2 sampling rate; 3 Gbps SDI with a 12 bit 4:4:4 or 10 bit 4:2:2 sampling rate; and other video or image formats) for facilitating transmission and storage. Post-production images may comprise a much smaller dynamic range than that of scene-referred HDR images. Furthermore, as images are delivered to end users' display devices for rendering, device-specific and/or manufacturer-specific image transformations occur along the way, causing large amounts of visually noticeable errors in rendered images in comparison with the original scene-referred HDR images.
The approaches described in this section are approaches that could be pursued, but not necessarily approaches that have been previously conceived or pursued. Therefore, unless otherwise indicated, it should not be assumed that any of the approaches described in this section qualify as prior art merely by virtue of their inclusion in this section. Similarly, issues identified with respect to one or more approaches should not assume to have been recognized in any prior art on the basis of this section, unless otherwise indicated.
GB 2311432 A discloses a method for converting an input frame of image data into a plurality of output frames of different spatial frequency spectra. After applying an individual gain to each output frame according to a model of the human visual system, the output frames are combined, thereby sharpening or softening the input image.
US 2003/0174284 A1 discloses a contrast sensitivity test embodied as a two-alternative forced choice examination using grating stimuli of randomly interleaved spatial frequencies.
WO 2007/014681 A1 discloses a method for calibrating a display system such that the display system conforms to an enforced standard for a selected range of parameters. Images encoded according to a standardized greyscale standard display function are converted into display-specific digital driving levels. The digital driving levels are converted into luminance output according to a native transfer curve of the display system based on human contrast sensitivity.